About Me

I'm a Christian, married, father of five, and worked as a high school teacher of English and History for twenty five years. The stress forced me into retirement. I've wanted to write as long as I can remember, because as soon as stories were read to me I wanted to make up my own.Now I can write full time, which I always wanted to do.

Monday, July 14, 2008

The truth comes out.

A news item today says that while the recession takes hold in the U.S. because of the housing market slump, there is an increase in marriage breakdowns. A divorce lawyer is quoted as saying: "One client was worried his wife might leave him if she found out that his net worth ahd fallen from $U.S.20 million to $8 million after he huge losses on property and other investments." It sounds almost beyond belief, but this is a respectable news paper, not a scandal rag.Then a psychotherapist comments: "...money can become an addiction that masks the reality. When that goes, reality has to be faced and accusations start flying." Certain things never get learned, it seems. The saying 'money can't buy happiness' is old and considered corny by some people, and yet it seems to be true. Wouldn't a person be embarrassed at their exposure as such a bare-faced gold-digger? Apparently not. So how does a relationship even start between people if it's going to fall apart just because they can't paper over all their problems in life with big spending? What happened to love? Perhaps it was never really there; yet it seemed to be, so...? Sentimentality aside, it could be that some people never learn what love is. They've never known proper love. A child that does not hear people speak does not learn to speak. A child who is never loved never learns what it really is to love. If that sounds appalling, ask the question: does every parent love their child, or do some of them nurture their child and treat them possessively, and control them in the process? They teach them, or drive them, to achieve, and to get things for themselves, but not to feel accepted and cared about unconditionally. Even saying this gets a groan nowadays from a cynical society. It's not exactly profound, because it's been said before, long ago. The trouble is, people are not learning. There are still people who do not have any use for other people except their own gain. No matter how often it's said, that greed and selfishness are ugly and self-destructive, they still rear their heads in the lives of people all around us. What does it take for people to learn? I've had to ask myself, too: how good is my heart? How much can I give without wanting something in return?

5 comments:

Good thoughts, Andrew. The reasons people marry these days seems rarely to be for true love. By that I mean the type of willingness to serve the other that love is supposed to be about. Generally speaking, lust is what drives most and in some cases it will compel some to overlook blatant shortcomings that would never pass muster were they found in any other person. The love that drives too many to marry is a very superficial love that cannot withstand what the future is likely to bring. It's what I think of when I hear someone say that they are "in love". Such is an involuntary attraction, usually based on something that might not last very long. I think real love is a choice, not a needful thing.

It doesn't sound romantic in the least, but I told my wife that I don't need her. I don't want her in the sense that I have to have her. But for a variety of reasons, I choose to be with her 'till death parts us. It's a conscious decision that trumps how I might feel when she once again throws out a magazine I hadn't finished reading. She can piss me off as I will her on occasion, but I'm not going anywhere. That's what my vow meant, and means, to me. For better, but just as importantly, for worse.

One can judge the depth of another's love by the negatives of the traditional vows, better than the positives. For poorer, for worse, in sickness. When the s**t hits the fan, are you still together. It seems sometimes that it is all too common that an individual will say, "Yeah, I said for better or worse, but I never thought it would be THIS bad!" People are too willing to call it quits when the least little thing goes wrong. That's not love. Real love was likely never present.

On the subject of undertaking to love someone rather than simply relying on involuntary attraction or desire: someone once told me that an arranged marriage can work well if the two people involved are properly committed and care for each other. I would not suggest arranging marriages, but the point still is: loving someone is partly a voluntary undertaking, not just a response to attraction - or desire to get something from them. My own marriage has had its down moments, but it is still going after nearly thirty years because we both feel committed to it in Christ. Were it not for that, our youngest three children would not have been born. I can, by the way, see exactly what democracy lover means: it looks like a really selfish and contemptible thing to leave a disabled wife and run after a rich partner. It does not bear thinking about what sort of despair the abandoned wife could have felt. Did I hear of this thing called conscience? I'm quite sure the three people who commented here would agree on that. Thank you for commenting. Feel free to visit any time.